Of Interest

The forthcoming issue of the Record will get more views outside of the Eph family than all of last year’s issues combined. The news of an elite college president banning an student-invited speaker is that big a deal. What articles should the Record be working on, in addition to general news stories?

1) History of speech debates/suppression at Williams. I am embarrassed to admit that I don’t know this history at all. Does anyone? When was the last time a speaker was banned at Williams? What have previous Williams presidents said about free speech on campus? Start here, although I couldn’t figure out how to search. Suggestions welcome! Also, Katie Nash, the new Archivist, knows her stuff.

2) A comparison to other NESCAC/elite schools. Ask Amherst and Swathmore if they have ever banned a speaker. Ask them if they ever would. They might use this occasion to make fun of Williams. Ask them if they have any official policies which would prevent their students from inviting Derbyshire to campus. Place Falk’s action in the context of our peers.

4) Interviews with faculty who have spoken out. I would start with EphBlog favorite Sam Crane who has an extensive discussion on his own blog. The key point to push with Sam is the following: Should students at Williams have fewer rights than students at MCLA? Because of the First Amendment, students at a state school like MCLA can not be punished for “hate speech” and can not be prevented from bringing (non-violent) speakers to campus, even if they are speakers that Sam Crane does not like.

Williams is a private institution and can have whatever rules it likes. But I would love to have Sam and other faculty on record as claiming that such restrictions benefit Williams students relative to their peers down the road at MCLA.

PS. Here is another suggestion for the name for the scandal: “Derb Makes Falk Uncomfortable.” This includes a reference to all three key players: John Derbyshire (who is nicknamed “Derb” in corners of the internet), Adam Falk and the student group Uncomfortable Learning. Previous discussion here. Only thing I don’t like is that it is too long. Suggestions?

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12 Responses to “Record Assignment Desk”

sigh says:

Alternative, better questions:
1. Who exactly is funding uncomfortable learning?
2. Why are they allowed to direct funds in this way when that’s generally verboten at Williams? Should they?
3. How was John Derbyshire selected? Who was involved in that decision?
4. What influence do the ANONYMOUS COWARDLY alumni donors have over the choices for specific speakers?
5. Did anyone at Uncomfortable Learning read his writings before selecting him? How do they defend his racist views and terminology?
6. Did anyone involved in this decision know that Derbyshire proudly attends and speaks at white supremacist conferences? If not, why not do a basic google search for him?
7. How much was uncomfortable learning planning to pay Derbyshire? How much is their yearly budget?

No reason both sets of questions can’t be asked. But this one (“How do they defend his racist views and terminology”) is a bit of a “when did you stop beating your wife” kind of question. Why is there any reason to believe that UC (or their alumni funders) defends Derbyshire’s views and beliefs.

The Berkshire Eagle came out with an opinion that opposes the decision to cancel the speech… Will be interesting to see how the record reacts. The editorial board of the record recently supported censorship of art at the log… So… My money is on support for Falk’s decision.

I think the story here is the unusual nature of censoring a conservative speaker simply because of his race realist views,frank takes on women and homosexuality. The insult to freedom of speech is particularly grievous in this case because Derbyshire is not an angry guy filled with hate. He is an intelligence mathematician who is pointing out what is obvious to most of us in an entertaining and engaging manner. To suggest that Derbyshire is hateful in comparison to other speakers — those from the left, generally — is extremely frightening. Leftist, in my experience, are generally inciting murder in one form or another. If the folks at Williams want to burn Derbyshire’s books, then I’m be proud to send some of mine to be added to the fire.

I got a visit this morning from anti-Communist filmmaker, Trevor Loudon. Yes, we discussed the topic of censorship at Williams College. It would be fun to see if my comments make it into the final film. See, http://anonymouspoliticalscientist.blogspot.com/

Amen to everything sigh said. Let’s see, should I try to respond to every stupid claim of of cowardly alum who writes a blog primarily composed of posts assailing black students for their genetic inferiority, who clearly funded the hateful, nasty white supremicist, blacks-are-inferior speaker (but who won’t admit his own conflict-of-interest in writing about it), and if the college didn’t draw a line SOMEWHERE, would keep doing so until Williams turns into little more than his personal venue for hosting his hand-chosen racist speakers, then laughingly acts as if this is national a controversy which is going to in any way harm the college President whose decision is OVERWHELMINGLY popular among faculty, alums, and students (the three constituencies he gives a damn about), and who basically has a fan club of one OTHER pathetic, self-pitying racist loser in life, who scapegoats all of his own personal failing on minorities, OR, watch the dancing 106-year-old Grandma in the White House one more time? F–k it, I’m out of here for good, can’t believe I was ever sucked back in to wasting any of my time in this pit of nastiness and myopia.

FWIW – I don’t support banning Derb. I think it gives his views credence that they do not have or deserve.

But the other points above are worth a response, Mr. Kane. The “controversy” seems to be a bit of entrepreneurial trolling, no?

My larger concern for Williams is that I remember the damage that the right wing cabal did to Dartmouth in the 1980s. It was too easy to write Dartmouth off as a bastion of out of touch, conservative, elitists.

The question for Mr. Kane is did that activism end up pulling Dartmouth to the right od did it have the exact opposite effect. I don’t know the answer.